Wednesday, August 21, 2013

This week on the Physics Central podcast I talk with John Gardner, a retired physicist and founder of the company ViewPlus. When Gardner was 48, an operation left him completely blind. While he managed to continue on with his physics career, he was struck by the lack of technology that could make complex graphs accessible to blind persons. So Gardner started working on a technology of his own, and in 1996 he co-founded ViewPlus in order to commercialize it. While the combined tactile/audio technology will certainly open doors for the blind community, Gardner says it has uses for sighted individuals as well. It could make scientific graphs more searchable, easier to categorize and and re-analyze, and it could provide a fantastic learning tool for students of all ages. Listen to this week's podcast to learn more about Gardner's story and the ViewPlus technologies.